Extract Part Of A String With SUBSTRING

Return only part of a text value by position and length.

5/5 supported engines validation-green 1 example 2 scenarios

Docker-validated Not currently validation-green

Example 1

Take the first three letters of a code

This example reads the first three characters and ignores the remainder of the source string.

Source table data Rows loaded before the example query runs.

Setup

CREATE TABLE products (sku VARCHAR(20));

INSERT INTO
  products (sku)
VALUES
  ('ABC-123');

Validated query Shared across supported engines.

SQL

SELECT
  SUBSTRING(sku, 1, 3) AS sku_prefix
FROM
  products;

Expected result Returned rows for the shared example.

sku_prefix
ABC

Each supported engine accepts the same `SUBSTRING` call used here.

Useful when

Where this command helps.

extracting a code or prefix from a structured string
taking a fixed-width slice from imported text

Explanation

What the command is doing.

SUBSTRING is useful when a column stores structured text and you only need one segment of it, such as a prefix, code, or fixed-width slice. It can also help when prototyping text parsing before moving the logic elsewhere.

Extract Part Of A String With SUBSTRING

Take the first three letters of a code

Where this command helps.

What the command is doing.

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